


crepes and Game of Thrones fluff

by sevenfists



Series: Sid/Geno Tumblr ficlets [19]
Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Cooking, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Game of Thrones References, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 21:33:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20571242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenfists/pseuds/sevenfists
Summary: Sid rolled his eyes. “You’d rather lose with me than win with anyone else, is that what you’re saying?”“Yes,” Zhenya said, because that was exactly it.





	crepes and Game of Thrones fluff

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this after the Pens lost game 3 to the Islanders because I was depressed about it 😂

The sound of his phone ringing pulled Zhenya from his Counter-Strike fugue. He’d set his phone to Do Not Disturb and there were only a few people who could get through. A glance at the screen showed Sid’s name.

Zhenya took off his headset and abandoned his game. He would probably die and his teammates would be pissed. Oh well.

He scrambled to answer the phone before it stopped ringing. “Hi, Sid.”

“Hey, G.” Sid sounded tired, but it was so good to hear his voice. Talking to him on the phone always gave Zhenya the same feeling as talking with him in bed at night as they fell asleep, like they had temporarily absconded to some parallel universe where no one could see or bother them. “You want to come over? _Game of Thrones_ is on in an hour.”

Zhenya hated that stupid show. There were too many characters to keep track of, and everyone had a bizarre accent that rendered the dialogue almost incomprehensible to him. At least there were tits sometimes.

Sid, accurately interpreting Zhenya’s hesitation, said, “I’ll make crepes. Uh, blini.”

Zhenya covered his eyes with his free hand, overcome by sudden emotion. He shouldn’t still be this knocked for a loop by Sid wanting his company or knowing him well enough to surmount Zhenya’s _Game of Thrones_-related objections. Well, he’d had a shitty day. No surprise that he was feeling a little raw.

He cleared his throat. “Where’s your parents?”

“They went back to their hotel after the game,” Sid said. “Told them I wanted to be alone. Listen, if you don’t want to come over, that’s fine, I was only—”

“No,” Zhenya said, sharply enough to cut Sid off mid-sentence. “No, I come right now.” He heard his voice going soft without his permission as he added, “I want to see you.”

“Yeah, I’m. I want to see you,” Sid said, equally soft. “Bring the Nutella, eh?” 

“Okay, be there soon,” Zhenya said, and went to look for his keys.

\+ + +

He let himself in through the side door with the key Sid had given him at Christmas, once it became clear this was going to be a regular thing and not just an occasional heat-of-the-moment hookup. Walking into Sid’s kitchen unannounced gave him that secret universe feeling again. Sid had a lot of people who loved him, but none of them were here now, with the team facing the brutal prospect of a sweep. Only Zhenya.

Sid was brushing a pan with oil when Zhenya came in, but he set it aside to let Zhenya give him a hug that was more of a defeated full-body slump. Sid was the perfect height for Zhenya to drape his arms over Sid’s shoulders and hunch down to bury his face in Sid’s neck.

“I know, G,” Sid murmured, his hands rubbing soothing circles over Zhenya’s back. “You haven’t been looking at Twitter, have you?”

Zhenya had, a little. Hence the Do Not Disturb and Counter-Strike. “No,” he lied.

“I told you not to,” Sid said. “Everyone on social media is an idiot.”

“I think it’s bad, Sid,” Zhenya said into Sid’s neck.

“Yeah,” Sid said. “Probably. But it’s not over until it’s over, eh?” He turned his head to press an awkward, lopsided kiss to Zhenya’s temple.

They had lost together before, and Zhenya knew how the process went. They would survive it. Life went on; every season opened with fresh hope. But it was hard and awful and embarrassing in the moment, and previous conversations had indicated that Sid was taking it hard, even though he was pretending now to be philosophical about it. Zhenya straightened up and cupped Sid’s dear face in his hands. “You best captain. Maybe we lose, and we upset, but then we win next year, okay? We win together lots. It’s not over.”

Sid rolled his eyes. “You’d rather lose with me than win with anyone else, is that what you’re saying?”

“Yes,” Zhenya said, because that was exactly it.

Sid’s face went blank, which meant he was having an emotion and trying to hide it, and then opened up into a heart-stopping, slightly watery smile, which meant he had remembered he didn’t have to hide things from Zhenya now. “Oh, G,” he said, and Zhenya bent to kiss him, dry and gentle, just once, before he stepped away.

“I, uh, bring Nutella,” Zhenya said, offering Sid the jar he had set on the counter. Sid didn’t keep any in his house; he said he would just eat it.

“Okay,” Sid said. “Let’s make some blini.”

Sid had started making blini for Zhenya when they started sleeping together, and now he did it once a week or so, as a special treat. He had gotten good at it; better than Zhenya ever was. Zhenya sat on the counter and watched Sid expertly ladle batter into the pan and then swirl it around to coat the cooking surface evenly. He used a spatula to lift the edges of each blin and then flipped it with his hands, the way Zhenya’s mother did. When the first one was ready, he handed it to Zhenya on a plate, still so piping hot that the Nutella Zhenya spread on top melted deliciously.

“It’s good,” he told Sid, cramming the rolled-up blin into his mouth.

“Give me a bite,” Sid said, leaning toward him and opening his mouth, and Zhenya fed him the rest of it, grinning as Sid nipped at his fingers. This was love, wasn’t it? Feeling this warmed by another person. Being this known. The weight of Zhenya’s feelings for Sid had anchored him all through the rocky season, and now it was almost over. He wasn’t prepared for it to end.

“Hurry up,” Zhenya said to the batter cooking in the pan. “We need to watch show.”

“You’d better speak to it in Russian,” Sid said, his eyes crinkling with his smile. “I don’t think it understands English.”

“Hurry up, my precious little pancake, my calorically extravagant darling,” Zhenya said. Sid grinned and flipped the blin.

\+ + +

They went downstairs to Sid’s media room loaded down with supplies: a plate stacked with blini, the Nutella and a knife, a bottle of white wine, two wine glasses, and a bag of the weird little sunflower seed crackers Sid had gotten hooked on. Zhenya’s favorite throw blanket was still folded up on the back of the couch, where he had left it the last time he came over. He claimed it at once and made himself a nest.

“There room for me under there?” Sid asked, fishing the corkscrew from his pocket to open the wine.

“Maybe,” Zhenya said, by which he meant that he fully expected Sid to snuggle with him and would be disappointed if it didn’t happen. The couch and ottoman were big enough for both of them to spread out, but they usually ended up mashed into one corner together as Zhenya used Sid like a body pillow. Sid was cozy.

They got settled in with their wine and their snacks just as the episode began. Sid was immediately rapt. Zhenya made no effort to follow what was going on. The CGI dragons were impressive. Everyone looked cold. Zhenya ate blini and enjoyed the way Sid reacted with his whole body, tensing when something exciting happened and jolting so hard when there was a jump scare that he spilled some of his wine. “Fuck, sorry,” he said, and Zhenya patted him and got up to find the paper towels.

When the bottle was empty and the blini were gone, Zhenya wedged himself into Sid’s arms and closed his eyes. Sid made low exclamations a few times as things happened on the screen. His hand cupped Zhenya’s shoulder and his thumb stroked a slow repeated path along the back of Zhenya’s neck. Zhenya wasn’t tired, and he didn’t doze, but he passed into a sort of quiet meditative state, thinking of nothing, soaking in the warmth and comfort of being so close to Sid.

“Hey,” Sid whispered after a while. “You asleep?”

“No.” Zhenya opened his eyes. The dragons were flying around, looking cold. 

“You know when we talked about Miami,” Sid said. “And I said I needed some time to think about it?”

“Yes,” Zhenya said, immediately a little wary. It had stung a bit that Sid hadn’t immediately agreed to go with him. Zhenya had been trying not to interpret that as a rejection or a sign that Sid wasn’t invested. If Sid didn’t want to go, he would have said so. He liked to think things over before he made a decision. Zhenya knew that.

“If the offer’s still on the table,” Sid said. “I’d like to go with you.”

Zhenya squirmed around until he could sit up. In the flickering light from the TV screen, the angles of Sid’s face were all softened. Zhenya took Sid’s hand in both of his and felt his throat close over. The season would end, but not this. They might lose, but Zhenya would still have Sid: the voice at the other end of the line, the still sleeping body beside him in bed. There might be no end to it.

“Sid,” he managed to choke out at last.

“Hey. I love you,” Sid said, which Zhenya had pretty much known, what with all the heart emojis Sid had texted him in the past few weeks, but hearing it was a knockout punch. He was a soggy wad of emotion after losing that afternoon, the consistency of wet toilet paper, and Sid had just done him in completely.

He lay down again and hid his dopey smile against Sid’s neck. “Love you, Sid.”

Sid’s hand slid slowly down his back and up again. “Maybe we won’t be able to go until June. That’d be nice, eh?”

That seemed unlikely. But Sid was right: it wasn’t over until it was over. Zhenya kissed Sid’s neck. “Yes, maybe.”

“You staying here tonight?” Sid asked.

“Yes,” Zhenya said, deciding to skip all of the usual teasing about Sid’s big ass taking up too much room in the bed. They both knew it was bullshit. Zhenya stayed the night every time he came over after dinner. He loved sleeping with Sid. He wasn’t going to drag himself home at this point. “Now shh, watch show.”

Sid huffed. “Yeah, okay.” The TV made an obnoxious noise that was probably a dragon roaring. Zhenya felt Sid’s attention shift back to the screen. He closed his eyes and snuggled in.


End file.
